Richmond dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1884-1903, 1887-07-21
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BATTLING WITH A HYDRANr.
A Geyser OF CrOton water Bursts
Oui I'm Madison square.


A geyser OF Croton spouting up fif
teen feet in q cloud of spray in front OF
the Seward statue in Madison Square
and the food on the streets that re-
suited kept the neighborhood in a tur-
moil for five hours yesterday. The
water came from the six-inch hydrant
at the southwest corner of the park.
Workmen engaged in mixing cement
for the conduits that are being built IN
the subway trenches in front of the
Fifth-Avenue hotel had opened the
hydrant TO get water, and had been
using it for an hour when, at .
O'Clock, they heard smothered report
under ground, and the next instant
saw column of water shoot straight
mp in the air nearly twenty feet from
the open top of the hydrant and an
other column shoot outward into
Broadway from the nozzle. The valve
controlling the water had broken and
let loose food. Workmen ran out OF
the trenches and tried to choke the
food off. They were swept aside like
chips in n mill-race. They thought
they could fasten down the lid at the
top of the hydrant and screw the big
cap over the nozzle. Both the lid and
the cap were blown from their hands.
The square was full Of promenaders,
but when they saw the geyser shoot up
in fine style and the men stagger back
before it they cut short their prone
made and hurried up to see the show.
A great throng gathered around the
Seward statue, at a safe distance. Well
dressed women caught their skirts up
and pressed forward to get o good
view, too. The workmen charged on
the geyser again, and were again
drenched and driven back, and then
they concluded that they would shut
the water-gate at the main. This gate
is seven feet under ground in the Fifth
avenue roadway, about five feet from
the curb. When they tried to get at
the gate, though, they found the man
hole cover buried underneath q pile of
granite stones seven feet high, that had
been taken up when the trenches were
dug.
All this time the hydrant was spout
ingwater by the ton and had made lake
around the hydrant. Subway-Inspector
J. u. Keegan telegraphed to the Pub
lie Works Department, and twelve men
came down with rush from the reser-
voir. They took a good look at the big
gey.er and then ran and let loose the
six hydrants on Fifth avenue and
on Broadway from Twenty-sixth street
to Twenty first street. They expected
that this would lessen the pressure 80
that they could tackle the geyser and
choke it of, but it didn't, and in fifteen
minutes Broadway at Twenty-frst
street was almost completely under
water, and Fifth avenue alongside OF the
hydrant ditto.
The reservoir men concluded to
charge the broken hydrant with rush,
and run a big wooden plug in the noz-
zle with an united effort They put on
rubber boots, and, armed with the plug
and sledge-hsmmers, dashed up into
the rain from the perpendicular stream.
i he horizontal stream squashed against
them and drenched the incautious spec
tators. The plug went flying out of
their hands, and they were driven back
soaked to the skin. They tried it three
times, and at last at O'Clock, after four
hours hard fighting, they got the plug
inte the nozzle, lashed fresh plank
over, and piled granite blocks against
the plank. They stuffed the top vent
with waste until they could clap the
cap on. After dark they opened the
manhole, made a flare with cotton
waste and kerosene, and shut down the
oota